Most important question for "Founders"

“Follow your passions”, “Listen to what you heart says” and similar advices are so much in fashion these days that without using such words, almost no good advice is considered complete and comprehensive. You would see stories running around in news and social circles and examples being quoted everywhere of people who dared to follow their passions and made it big. The discussion around doing your own thing is so intense that it makes the working class professionals who are into jobs feel insignificant and useless. As if everybody should be entrepreneurs and if you are not yet, you should try and do that someday. Otherwise your taking birth on this planet is wasted. Why were you born in the first place? To be an entrepreneur, isn't it? I see so many ‘Founders’ everywhere that it forces me to ask that what exactly are these ‘Founders’ finding and where all these ‘foundings’ are going. 

Please dont take me wrong. I respect hard working entrepreneurs. Who wouldn't want to be in the comfort of a monthly pay check, insurance, gratuity etc. It take loads or courage & hard work to start something and then try to make it big. If it wasn't difficult, so less people wouldn't have succeeded at it. More so because I myself have travelled the journey and seen both sides, the ups and downs and goods and bads. Honestly speaking it sucks at a lot of times to a level where you question your decision. So, its job well done if you are an entrepreneur or trying to be one. I respect that. Keep at it.

My concern is when the joy of adding a ‘founder’ to your title overtakes the thrill of being in middle of action and actually doing stuff. The bigger problem arises when you see early progress and start growing. So much of energy, talent, skills are being invested (read wasted) for running in a mad race to add a title to your name. To me its no difference from running for a promotion in a job, where heavier the title, more powerful you feel. 

The question to ask is what problems are you solving, for who? Even a question why are you solving that particular problem? What do you want to achieve? I mean should you really be investing (read wasting) your time (which is the only limited asset you have), energy, skills and and talents to help people buy potatoes. Yeah yeah…thats also pushing the human race forward in some sense. The humanity and mankind would be better and this world a smarter place to live if somebody could help people buy potatoes online using an app. But to me personally, the real entrepreneurship is when you are trying to solve poverty, health, water scarcity, child malnutrition, human rights, gender discrimination, terrorism and similar problems. The time, money, energy, skills and talents of young hard working ‘founders’, if directed to solve such issues which touch the lives of deprived human beings and make this world a better place to live, that to me would be real entrepreneurship.

Sam Baisla 

CEO | Entrepreneur | Startup Expert | Consultant | Coach

Twitter: @baislasam

Skype:  sam.baisla

Linkedin: in.linkedin.com/in/sambaisla

E-mail: [email protected] | [email protected]